


Pepper's New Pasttime

by l_ostsheep3



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (2012), The Avengers - Ambiguous Fandom
Genre: F/M, Gen, Mention of slash relationships;, character discovers fanfiction, fanfiction about fanfiction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-04
Updated: 2013-04-04
Packaged: 2017-12-07 10:35:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,564
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/747536
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/l_ostsheep3/pseuds/l_ostsheep3
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Pepper Potts discovers the world of Avengers Fanfiction</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pepper's New Pasttime

**Author's Note:**

> My apologies if Pepper and Tony are a bit OOC...this is my first published fiction in this fandom.

Tony can’t help but notice how quiet the penthouse is when the elevator door opens. The normal quiet hum of the television is missing, Pepper isn’t playing any music and there isn’t even that hum of electricity that can sometimes be heard in the quiet of the night.  Making his way toward the bedroom Tony checks to make sure that nothing is amiss, senses going on alert given that it isn’t all that late – for him at least – and his girlfriend should still be up.

Pepper is sitting cross-legged on their bed with her laptop open in front of her and a pained look on her face.  She closes the laptop quickly when Tony clears his throat from just inside the doorway.  The smile she gives him doesn’t quite reach her beautiful blue eyes. 

“Hey, you’re here early,” the redhead says in greeting.

“I left JARVIS to run a few tests on the suit improvements I was working on, thought I might come up and spend some time with the world’s best girlfriend,” Tony answers, sidling over to the bed and sinking down next to Pepper, leaning in to give her a warm kiss.

Pepper returns the kiss, but it doesn’t feel like her heart’s completely in it, “you okay, Pep?”

“Hm?“ she murmurs, looking over at him, “oh yeah, just distracted.”

“The quarterly reports can wait until business hours tomorrow.”  Tony takes the closed laptop off her lap and sets it down on the floor. “I’d hoped to spend a couple of hours _being_ the distraction.”

Pepper laughs softly at the implication, “It wasn’t quarterly reports,” she answers, glancing down at her laptop.

“Then what had you so riveted – and upset-looking.”

She shakes her head, as she turns her eyes back to meet his, “it was nothing, I guess.”

“Pep, that didn’t look like a ‘nothing’.” Tony can’t quite keep the worry from his voice, he’s rarely seen that look on his Pepper’s face, and the few times he has it hasn’t been good.

“It’s okay, Tony,” Pepper promises, reaching out to take the dark-haired man’s hands in her own, thumbs rubbing the pads of his palms, letting herself become grounded in the connection with her mate.

“Please, Pep, I hate it when you keep things that are bothering you to yourself.  Did one of those gossip websites post something about you just being my cover girlfriend again?” He looks down at their joined hands, bringing hers up to brush a kiss against her knuckles.  He knows how much it gets to her when every few months a website or magazine will speculate that they’re only still together because she’s covering for his ‘indiscretions’, to keep him out of the spotlight now that he’s part of the Avengers – apparently superheroes have to be straight-laced and monogamous – which he is - but given his previous reputation the gossip rags don’t exactly believe it. 

“Not exactly.” Pepper can’t quite help the blush when she answers.

Tony doesn’t miss the reddening of her cheeks, and thinks it’s rather adorable.   “You know that it’s not true, that I really love you,” he says, reaching to touch two fingers against her jaw to get her to look at him.

“I know,” she gives him a warm smile.

“Then talk to me, please,” he gives her a bit more mischievous smile, “at least let me know who I have to go torment now.”

“Tony!” Pepper laughs despite herself.  “You don’t need to go torment anyone.”

“Yes I do, when you’re looking that upset.”

“Okay, you win!” Pepper laughs softly, looking down at their joined hands.  “I found this website, it has stories on it about you and the Avengers.”

“News stories?” Tony asks, though he suspects the answer is ‘no’.

“No, fiction, they call it fan fiction, it started back in the 70’s with Star Trek, and apparently it’s gotten huge.  It’s basically people who enjoy writing stories using known characters.”

“Oh, yeah, I read a couple of those back in college – someone had a magazine.”

Pepper nods and smiles in response.  “The only thing now is that it’s not just about fictional characters; some people have started writing it about the Avengers. “

“We’re not exactly Kirk, Spock and McCoy though, we’re real people.”

“It doesn’t seem to matter.”

“Well, I can’t buy the internet...but I wish I could,” the billionaire says.

“Thank God you can’t,” Pepper laughs at his standard answer to dealing with news media that frustrates him.

“Just stay away from those sites, if they bother you that much.”

Pepper blushes harder.  “That’s the thing, they don’t – not all of them.  Some of them are kind of compelling – and hilarious when I know you all so well.”

“Oh really?”

“Yeah, there’re stories where Clint and Natasha have kids,” she says with a laugh.  “Stories where Steve can’t get the hang of technology; and I’ve found stories where Bruce has so very little control that he hides in his lab all the time.  You know, all those things that couldn’t be further from the truth.”

Tony can’t help but laugh at those examples.  “Steve took to technology like a duck to water!  And Bruce…he’s got more control than just about anyone I know – including me.”

“Yeah, I know, right.” Pepper laughs again.

“ Whatever you do, don’t tell Phil about those stories with Clint and Natasha, he wouldn’t kill anyone, but he might make their life a living hell.”

“Yeah, I thought of that too,” she can’t help but grin at the thought, Phil is so over-protective of Clint, especially since their reunion after the Chitauri invasion. 

“I hate to ask, but I have to know…anything about us?”

“Oh yeah,” Pepper smiles, then sighs.

“Well, that’s a mixed reaction if I ever saw one.”

“There are a lot of stories where we’re together.  But some of them are so far off the mark it could be funny.”

Tony is curious, but decides to focus on what’s bothering his girlfriend, rather than learning what people are saying.  “I hear a ‘but’ in there…” Tony kicks off his shoes and slips into the bed next to her, drawing his favorite redhead against his chest.

Pepper snuggles into his chest, breathing in his scent and sighing at his warmth.  “There’s a whole subset of fan fiction called ‘slash’ – which basically means putting two people of the same sex together in a relationship; and quite a lot of it involves you.“

Tony startles briefly at her comment, tightening his arm around her, “Ah, I think I see where this is going…you’re worried that there might be some truth to it.”

Pepper is so surprised that she nearly jumps out of his embrace, “No!” she nearly shouts, her heart beating hard in her chest. “No,” she tries again, her voice quieter, her heart slowing from its rapid pace, “I know you’re not with anyone else, I trust you to be with just me.  It’s not that, not really anyway.  I just….I’ve been finding a lot of stories where the story notes say that they’re about us – or have us as a relationship in the story and then the writer breaks us up so that they can put you with someone else.”

Tony goes completely silent and still at that comment, “I’m not leaving you,” the conviction in his voice would be enough to convince her that it’s true, even if she did have any doubt – which she doesn’t.

“I know.  I know that.  I’m just frustrated because some of these stories are really good – I mean _really_ good, and the authors are very, very good writers, so by the time I realize that they’re breaking us up, I don’t want to stop reading. “

“Ah,” Tony answers, stroking his hand down her arm, cuddling her closer as he sighs. “Can you pretend that the stories aren’t about us?  That they’re some other billionaire, genius, former-playboy, philanthropist and his incredibly sexy and intelligent girlfriend.”

Pepper has to laugh at the description of them, though it warms her heart to hear him describe himself as a former-playboy, because she really intends to keep him all to herself.  “I’m trying.”

“You could just give up reading fan fiction…” Tony says, nuzzling into her hair, “I can think of at least 10 ways to keep you sufficiently occupied and take your mind off it.”

“Only 10, Mr. Stark?” Pepper’s voice lowers just a notch as she teases back.

“Well, maybe 20?”

“Only 20?” she echoes, half-turning in his embrace to brush her lips to his.

“Okay, okay, you got me…I can find dozens of ways to keep your mind off of fan fiction,” Tony says, grinning against her mouth, leaning in the last little bit needed to seal his mouth to hers and kiss her deeply, letting out a warm moan as she responds, her hands sliding over his shoulders, her body angling in to meet his, the press of a warm body and an even hotter mouth sending her frustrations and upsets regarding the Avenger’s fiction to the back of her mind – though she knows that she’s going to keep on reading, even if she does get frustrated – some of it is much too good to give up.  At the same time, she knows that what they have is so good, so right, that neither of them will ever let it go.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> This is not intended to ridicule or offend any of my fellow authors. It is a result of my own frustration with the relatively small amount of Pepper/Tony fan fiction out there. 
> 
> My own philosophy is much like Pepper's, I'll read it if it's a good story - even if it veers from Pepper/Tony or even if it doesn't have Pepper/Tony at all. 
> 
> And yes, I do read slash - in fact this is the first fandom where I haven't written primarily slash.


End file.
